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Rocking Around
St. Paul, as he wandered around the Areopagus, was impressed by the religiosity of the Athenians. He had just, so to speak, taken a tour through the city observing the style of their religious objects, which primarily were dedicated to the top deities which might be formed out of gold, silver or stone, something earth artists had created. Yet the time, Paul declared, was coming when such images will mean nothing, because more important and more final, on a specific day in the future - which still has not arrived - the whole earth will be judged in righteousness “by a man whom He has appointed”, He being God, the appointee being Jesus.
 Our planet is, up to now, a controlled assembly of stones, old boulders, rocks which have busted into particles, avoiding the asteroids wandering around in the massive space of the universe, which may or may not wreck our rocky earth. Currently there is a space rock out there in unlimited space, as big as Egypt’s Great Pyramid, that could crash into Earth anytime we get in its way, although NASA is alert and has created a way of giving such roving rocks a small nudge so they pass on by the earth and we can breathe a size of relief. I guess it’s sort of like a pin ball machine. We don’t pay much attention to what is floating around in outer space.
Ironically, anything that is a stone, big, little, monster, will never disappear. We can become ashes, but a rock can just chip away but will always have a body, so to speak. We also have, now, in this era, “rock stars”, which not only means they are movers and shakers, they can sing and beat the drums, but they are idols that give joy to all ages who like to move and shake and listen to loud music. This is not in the stone category. Of course, stone now has a negative relation - one is “stoned” because they are under the influence of some wild and crazy drug.
Oh well.
As children we learned sticks and stones could break our bones, but words (names) can never hurt us. How often those stones, loose with the bearer of bad names, won the argument because the opponent had too much pride and fear of being beaten. And then there is rock, paper, scissors, a quickie which can settle a lot of arguments if nothing else. Are stones and rocks negative? have you heard of the Petoskey stone? There are rocks that glow in the dark, and some that play music if moved in a certain way. Many of us collect those very precious ones that are deep under the soil - those stones like amethysts (the underground of Uruguay is filled with this stone), emeralds, healing stones like Chrysocollas and rocks that are rough or smooth, rocks so old, they have been here since God created this place on this traveling rock, where we can sing an old song, “Rocks of Ages, cleft for me, let me hide myself in thee, let the water and the blood from thy wounded side which flowed, be of sin the double cure; save from wrath and make me pure.” Rocks are called up to save us.
The point is we live on a rock floating and twirling through space. It is solid. It is one of billions. And yet, we claim that our amazing God controls not only this monster rock we live on, but apparently is master of all the universe which is so beyond our conception that it’s best not to worry about it. The worst-case scenario on our earth is a volcanic eruption, like those in Hawaii or Cotopaxi or Mt. Vesuvius - there are so many, regularly, - and they stir up life and death when the hot coals bubble fire within the giant volcano which are the very rocks which hold together this earth be it above the sea or below it. Often what is left - when the fire goes out, the lava cools down, the magma settles into forms eating up the earth, it leaves amazing rocks that range from obsidian and diamonds to amethysts almost as large as houses. Meanwhile, rocks in small versions become the enticement and spiritual analysis of those who read palms and tell your future with stones and tarot cards.
This was not something Jesus approved or maybe even knew. Were there rock experts then? Did servants of Kings and Emperors and Tsars and Wangs and Shahs dig deep for diamonds and gold? Were they terrified when they came across a stirred-up volcano? Did they know it’s power? For sure the only one who could control the bubbling fires and rivers of fire would have been and still is God, the master of all the universe.
Volcanos can be above or below water. When they burst out, I guess to expand its space or get some fresh air, that volcano can do all kinds of damage to anyone living, moving, or praying in the area. Mostly they occur where tectonic plates are moving around each other, under water, shifting the balance of the earth rock. They don’t just erupt where the climate is hot. They can burst out even in Aleutian Islands of Alaska or icy Russia stretching and thinning and pulling and pushing and agitating our fears. I remember once in 2015, needing to leave Uruguay, all flights were canceled because airlines could not fly due to the dust from volcano Villarrica in neighboring Chile, which had just erupted. More than 80 per cent of our planet’s surface is volcanic so if many erupt at the same time, imagine how that would interfere with travel and electronics like internet.
Although Jerusalem, Damascus, Jordan, and its environs seem to be rock hills and mountains anxious with dust and sand and more dust, many of these rocks hold extraordinary treasures as Petra in Jordan, and salt formations near the Dead Sea, and the Rift Valley of Africa, and the deserts where life is said to have begun thousands of years ago. These areas of the Middle East were not only the origins of life, but it seems to be where human life grew, expanded, became the upright form of today, and God enveloped these rock-formed deserts and hills in His arms as the place for all his wandering people, from Abraham forward.
Paul tries to explain that “Since we are God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the deity is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of mortals (although I doubt any of the earth stone was formed by any man. Only God could create the basis of earth.) And God’s promise, which has still not occurred, was that we must repent our wayward ways and hatreds and violence and abuse, and we need to get our hearts together and strong. First and foremost, every man and woman needs to repent for all their wrongdoing, their greed, their doubts, their violence, their failure to acknowledge God. Paul felt that God was coming on a fixed day, a date none of us know, to judge the world because, Paul said, on that day, Jesus would rise again from the dead and somehow all of us within his view, hand and heart, will be lead up to the heavens, which could be another rock place or an endless space where our souls and spirits can flourish and love one another with no doubt or regret. I pray for this day because we are doing a rotten job here on earth of taking care of each other, particularly our youth, and those who don’t look like us because we think we are better than other colors. It’s just evil knocking at our souls to try to win us over to whatever hell Satan has in store for those who don’t believe in love or kindness, equality or eternity or Our Great God.
I loved, back in the day, rock wall climbing. It gave me a feeling of achievement when living in Jackson Hole, Wyo. I admire probably more than anyone those rock heroes, those super-brave humans who, like monkeys, with only a tiny sack of dust and more courage than any normal person, climb those most amazing giant rocks and edges of our Western mountains holding on to a crevice what seems nothing but his fingers and thinks not of the threat of death right below. They know and can communicate with rocks probably better than anyone else currently on this planet. Bless them.
~ Rev
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audrey@audreytaylorgonzalez.com
www.audreytaylorgonzalez.com
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